Leverage on TNT: S5 /Ep6: “The D. B. Cooper Job” Review

Leverage Season 5 Episode 6, “The D. B. Cooper Job” opens with a burglary. Leverage fans expect Parker to be a part of it as the two thieves are about to get caught. The next scene shows our returning character, FBI agent Todd McSweetin, portrayed by Gerald Downey, peeling off his mask. As expected, Parker is revealed under hers.

Back at Leverage Headquarters, Parker must explain to Nate what an FBI agent is doing in their new Portland bar. Parker claims that her old alias as an FBI agent is still intact, and just as Eliot insisted on helping Toby in The French Connection Job, Parker insists they help Todd. His father is dying and they’d broken into the FBI’s Portland Headquarters to steal files.

Todd explains his father’s critical illness and the one case he spent most of his FBI career trying to solve: The D. B. Cooper case.

Sophie takes on the job, usually held by Hardison, of briefing the Leverage team. We can tell that she’s just as excited to be working on the case as she would be pulling off the crime. D. B. Cooper is obviously a hero of hers. She can tell the story, with interruptions, in about a minute flat!

Nate is sold to the client and his father as a Profiler. As he takes on the persona of FBI agent Peter McSweetin through flashbacks while the aging agent tells his tale, Nate actually proves himself to be an excellent profiler at that.

Sophie gets the role of McSweetin’s wife and Todd’s mother. Parker is the stewardess that is married to Steve Reynolds, the man who became McSweetin’s partner for many years. She was also a stewardess on the plane, the one D. B. Cooper held hostage; his mouthpiece to the FBI and the pilot. It was her description of him that gave the FBI their composite sketch.

Eliot plays a young Steve Reynolds, sliding over the hood of a car in one scene and generally busting heads in a 70’s version of old fashioned Eliot fashion. Ironically Steve Reynolds is also a war veteran as is Eliot.

Hardison’s character “Reggie” is so much like the 70’s cliché black cop that I can’t even describe it! You have to watch it, the hair, the side burns, the attitude, all a throwback to 70’s cop TV like “The Mod Squad”.

As always, there are so many recaps that give away every single line and while I have written down the entire episode, I hate to spoil it for everyone. For fans of the show this episode held a different set of twists and turns. Ronny Cox guest stars as Peter McSweetin, the main story teller in this episode. As the story unfolds we are carried back in time by the music, the hair, the costumes the acting and yes, the mustaches. The finale is a twist that few fans saw coming. Watch and find out who D. B. Cooper is, and what the Leverage team does with that information.

The D.B. Cooper Job was written by Chris Downey and directed by Marc Roskin.